Traditionally, there have been commonly used those cards wherein necessary data such as information on the card bearer's address, name, number and other items for personal identification, entered by printing etc., are given on the surface of a platy support of paper, plastic or another material and a photograph or another piece of personal information is applied thereto and marked with an overlapping seal, as certificate identification cards such as employee cards, credit cards, driving LICENSES certificates and traffic permits.
However, these kinds of cards are faulty in that forgery and alteration are easy to do. Also, since these cards are not resistant to friction etc., they often become dirty or damaged while being conveyed routinely. As a solution to this drawback, there have recently been used those cards wherein a light-sensitive material prepared by coating a light-sensitive emulsion such as silver halide emulsion on a platy support is used to print personal data and a photographic portrait. Also known are those cards designed in different ways to prevent falsification, such as those prepared by coating and thermally sealing such cards with resin film, and those prepared by laminating such cards with resin film on both faces.
However, these methods using a light-sensitive material are faulty in that a troublesome liquid processing and a large scale apparatus are required for image formation. To overcome these shortcomings, Japanese Patent Application Nos. 131939/1988 and 293977/1988 propose a method of image formation, especially for ID card image, by forming an image in a thermoplastic resin layer by thermal transfer printing or transferring an image formed in a heat developing type silver halide light sensitive material and laminating this resin layer with an appropriate lamination material.
Although this method permits the obtainment of an image through a simple and dry process, the obtained image is unsatisfactory as to storage stability and sharpness. Particularly, deterioration of sharpness is obtained due to heating upon lamination.
Also, the contact between thermoplastic resin and lamination material in the obtained recording member is insufficient, which poses a problem on the storage and prevention of falsification of the recording member.
This problem tends to become aggravated when lamination temperature or lamination material is changed to lower the degree of deterioration of sharpness.
In addition, in issuing various certificates such as ID cards and pamphlets, there have been demands of applicants for shortening the time lag between the submission of application form and the issuance of certificate whereas there have been demands of issuers for minimizing issuing time per certificate since they must do enormous tasks in a given time.